1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a polymer sample analyzer for analyzing polymer materials such as plastics.
2. Description of the Related Art
In our modern society, polymer materials such as natural rubbers and plastics, as well as metal materials such as steel, play an important role. The polymer materials are now indispensable for our daily life as materials for various films, fibers, containers and the like.
It is known that when the polymer materials are used for a long period of time, their physical or chemical properties deteriorate gradually owing to external factors. The deterioration is mainly caused by heat, light, mechanical stress or the like and it also occurs by the biological or chemical reaction. Of these, the deterioration caused by light is presumed to occur because optical energy cleaves their polymer structure and radicals formed thereby cause an oxidation chain reaction (“Polymer Degradation—Principles and Practical Applications—”, written by Wolfram Schnabel, translated by Junkichi Sohma, published by Shokabo, 1993; “Practical Polymer Materials Classified by Their Properties”, Kogyo Chosakai Publishing Inc., 2002; “Developments in Polymer Degradation—7”, N. Grassie, Elsevier Applied Science, 1987).
Tests on optical deterioration have conventionally been conducted by exposing a polymer material to real sunlight outdoors or exposing it to the light from an arc lamp, which is close to sunlight, by using a weathermeter. When the weathermeter is used, humidification is sometimes conducted simultaneously with the exposure to the light from an arc lamp.
The above-described tests are however accompanied with the following inconveniences. It takes from several months to several years to get results of the exposure test of a polymer material outdoors, while the test using a weathermeter requires large facilities and a lot of money and moreover, it takes from several weeks to several months to get its test results. The results of the above-described tests relate to the deterioration on the surface of the sample to be observed visually or under a microscope, or to mechanical properties such as tensile strength after deterioration so that it is impossible to obtain a chemical finding on the progress mechanism of deterioration of the polymer itself constituting the polymer material or various additives such as antioxidant and UV absorber contained in the polymer material.